Full Professor of Information Systems Management and Policy

School of Information Systems & Management, Heinz College

Department of Engineering and Public Policy, College of Engineering

Carnegie Mellon University (contact: pedrof@cmu.edu)

NEWS

·      September 2023: New Paper on Smartphones in the Classroom

I am pleased to share the latest version of my paper on the impact of smartphones in the classroom on the performance of students. We run a RCT and measure student and teacher behavior using lecture video feeds. We find that allowing students to use smartphones during lectures at will reduces the student performance compared to when smartphones are banned from the classroom. However, allowing smartphones into the classroom and having teachers ask students to use them to assist instruction increases performance. We show several heterogeneous effects in the paper, present several robustness checks, and discuss implications for public policy [paper].

·      June 2023: Promotion to Full Professor

I am pleased to announce that I have been promoted to Full Professor at Carnegie Mellon University. I look forward to the next steps and future academic challenges!

·      May 2023: Seminars and Presentations

I presented my paper on combining movie recommendations from industry experts and machine learning algorithms at the MAD Conference at Columbia Business School and at the Marshall Business School, University of Southern California. This paper is ongoing joint work with Zekai Fan and Miguel G. Matos. We show that recommendations from machines and industry experts can be combined in ways that improve matching.

I have also visited the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University, where I presented my paper with Miguel G. Matos on the surprising effects of binge watching on the likelihood that consumers subscribe video on demand.

·      April 2023: AIS Research Productivity Ranking in Major IS Journals

I have been ranked 17^th worldwide in weighted-adjusted research productivity for papers published in Information System Research and in Management of Information Systems Quarterly (two top research journals in the field) in the 2020-2022 window.

·      March 2023: 2023 US News Rankings for Carnegie Mellon University

Undergraduate degree in Information Systems Management: #1

Undergraduate Degree in Data Analytics: #2

Masters in Information Technology Management: #1

MBA Specialization in Information Systems Management: #2

MBA Specialization in Data Analytics: #2

·      February 2023: Paper on Citizens Journalism Accepted at Management Science

My paper co-authored with Tom Grad, Ananya Sen and Jorg Claussen entitled “(How) Does User Generated Content Impact Content Generated by Professionals? Evidence from Local News” has been accepted for publication at Management Science. Stay tuned for our pre-print draft.